Poison Ivy (32 page)

Rabbit greeted him. “Morning, Professor. You going to be warm enough?”

“I'll be fine.”

After that, neither Rabbit nor Stevenson spoke for a few minutes. During the night a light frost had touched the dewy grass, and the car's headlights reflected from myriad stiff blades. An owl flew low and silently across the road.

“I hear the bluefish are running,” Stevenson said.

“Right,” said Rabbit. “Derby's on this month.”

“I suppose it brings in a lot of anglers?”

“All over the world,” said Rabbit. “So you're on Island doing research?”

“I'm spending a year studying coastal sand transport from here to Florida.”

“Where do you teach?” asked Rabbit.

“MIT. I'm on sabbatical this year, doing my own research.” Stevenson was well aware of Victoria Trumbull's warning. But Rabbit seemed like a pretty ordinary guy, at least, so far. “How'd you get the name ‘Rabbit'?”

Rabbit laughed. “I was a sprinter in college and my name is Jack, so it morphed into Jack Rabbit.”

A skunk wandered into the road and Rabbit braked hard. “Don't want to tangle with them,” he said as four baby skunks tottered across behind their mother.

“Where'd you go to college?” asked Stevenson, when the skunks had reached the other side of the road.

“Harvard.” He pronounced it “Hah-vud.”

Stevenson laughed. “What's your field?”

“Astrophysics. Got a Ph.D.”

“I'm impressed,” said Stevenson. “Astrophysics and you're working as a carpenter?”

“You needn't be impressed. This Island has the most highly educated workforce in the world. Ph.D.'s all over the place working as landscapers, fishermen, farmers, carpenters, painters, you name it.” Rabbit waved a hand at the trees arching over the road. “We want to live here and we don't much care whether we use those degrees or not.” He checked the rearview mirror. “Someone else is up and about. Another crazy fisherman.”

“Did you ever teach?” asked Stevenson, feeling a first twinge of anxiety. The serial killer had been a college professor at some time, Mrs. Trumbull had assured him.

“I taught for a while, got fed up with academic politics and the petty power struggles and quit. Carpentry is a lot less stressful. No one to bite your back.”

“Tell me,” said Stevenson.

Rabbit slowed the car. “We're about to pass our latest attraction, the site of mass burials. Care to take a side trip and see where they've dug up eleven bodies?”

“I heard about that.” Stevenson felt a touch of fear.

“College professors,” said Rabbit. “All eleven victims were college professors.”

“So I heard.” Stevenson's voice was tight. “And they haven't caught the killer yet.”

“Nope. They probably won't until he kills again.”

Stevenson said nothing.

They turned left onto Greenleaf Street. Rabbit pulled over to the side of the road and parked.

“Place is really dark,” said Stevenson.

“The Island doesn't have much light pollution. Get to see the stars that way.”

“Let's forget the sightseeing,” said Stevenson. “I don't want to miss a minute of fishing.”

“Scared?” asked Rabbit. He reached across Stevenson and opened the glove compartment. “Flashlight in here somewhere. Remember how it was when you were a kid listening to ghost stories? This is the grown-up version. Real scary stuff.”

“Uh…” said Stevenson.

“It'll be fun. Won't be another chance like this.”

*   *   *

“I appreciate your giving me a lift from the hospital at this hour of the morning,” Bigelow said to the newspaper delivery man.

“No problem,” said Robert. “No big deal.” He took one hand off the wheel, and with the other, found cigarette papers in the well between the seats. One-handed, he detached a paper, filled it with tobacco, rolled a cigarette, licked the edge of the paper, and sealed it by pressing it against his chin.

Bigelow watched in awe.

Still one-handed, Robert stuck the cigarette onto his lower lip, produced a kitchen match from a shirt pocket, swiped his thumbnail against the tip to ignite it, and lit his cigarette, steering all the while left-handed. He transferred the steering responsibility to his left knee, opened the window, and tossed out the spent match. He started to close the window.

“I like the fresh air,” said Bigelow.

“It's fresh, all right. Frost last night.” Both hands back on the wheel, the cigarette dangling from his lip, he said, “Shouldn't take long to find your glasses.”

Bigelow said, “We'll need a ladder. I suppose we can find it in one of the buildings.”

“I saw a lawn chair around someplace.”

Bigelow watched the cigarette ash grow and drop onto Robert's shirt. “Pity the grounds are such a shambles. It was an attractive property.”

“Aeration does it good,” said Robert. The cigarette rode up and down on his lip when he spoke.

Bigelow glanced at him. “What do you mean?”

Robert looked down at his greasy sweatshirt and swiped off the ash. “Taught forestry management for a few years.”

“You taught?” asked Bigelow. “College level?”

“Graduate level.”

“Tenured?” asked Bigelow.

“Don't talk to me about tenure,” said Robert.

“What happened?”

“You mean, why did I get fired?” Robert turned watery eyes on Bigelow, who could just make them out in the dashboard light.

“Well, yes.”

Robert held an imaginary bottle to his lips.

“Sorry about that.”

“Don't be. I hated that rat race.”

“How are we doing for time?” asked Bigelow.

“We've got time.”

“Did you bring a flashlight?”

Robert reached down into the well and produced one.

“I don't want to go back down into that grave,” said Bigelow with a shudder.

“Can't say that I blame you.”

The cigarette had burned down to a nubbin. Robert squashed out the ember with his thumb and forefinger and tossed the butt out the window.

They rode the rest of the way up the dark and deserted Main Street in silence, and Robert pulled over to the side. “Won't get a ticket this time of day.”

“I certainly hope not,” said Bigelow, getting out of the passenger side.

*   *   *

Brownie, sleeping with his head on Killdeer's thigh, woke with a start, the hair on his back lifted. Killdeer put a hand on the dog's neck and stroked him.

“Okay, buddy?” He started to get up, but his thigh, where Brownie's head had rested, was numb and his leg buckled. He fell back with a crash.

“Damn.” He rubbed feeling back into the leg.

Brownie growled a deep-throated rumble.

“Hush up, boy! What do you sense?” Killdeer looked around and saw the faint glow of a flashlight. Man and dog moved silently toward the light along the narrow strip of ground between mounds of dirt and open graves. Killdeer stopped. Brownie clearly wanted to go forward.

“Hold it,” whispered Killdeer, crouching on a wide spot. “We wait here.”

*   *   *

Victoria led the way to a wide mossy place within a thicket that had been undisturbed in the search for cadavers. She gazed up at the familiar constellations, Orion, the hunter. Cassiopeia. The Pleiades. The Big Dipper, its pointer stars pointing to the North Star. The navigating star, her grandfather told her.

Howland nudged her, and she looked away from the bright stars. Her eyes, adjusted to the dark, picked out the glimmer of a flashlight.

“Let's move closer,” he said. “Can you find the way?”

“Easily. I know the campus well,” said Victoria.

They moved close enough to hear low voices. Victoria recognized Stevenson's.

“I warned him,” she whispered. “He didn't listen.”

“Who's he with?” whispered Howland.

“Robert, my landscaper.”

“I thought you said ‘Rabbit.'”

“‘Robert' with a Boston accent is ‘Rabbit,'” Victoria whispered. “I never suspected him until this evening. I recognized his car.”

“His car looks like a hundred other Island cars. Looks exactly like mine.”

“I know cars,” whispered Victoria. “It's Robert's.”

*   *   *

“Creepy,” Stevenson murmured. “Let's get out of here.”

“Perfect time to view this place,” said Rabbit, swinging the flashlight around in an arc, illuminating mounds of dirt and deep black pits.

“I want to get to the fishing spot.”

“There's time,” said Rabbit.

“This is dangerous. Why aren't the graves filled in?”

“They want to catch the killer first,” said Rabbit.

“Seems like an opportunity for the killer to bury more victims without having to dig the graves.”

Rabbit shone the flashlight into the nearest grave. “One shove and down you go. Bring someone here on a night of fishing, smack him on the head, and topple him in. Just like that.” He snapped off the light, and the night was darker than the darkest imagined darkness.

Stevenson backed away from the grave.

Rabbit laughed.

*   *   *

“We've got to make our move,” whispered Victoria.

“Wait,” said Howland.

*   *   *

“You'll have to lead,” said Bigelow to Robert.

“No problem.”

“Can you find the grave?”

“I was there when you fell in.”

They walked from where they'd parked across the narrow sidewalk, and through the undergrowth at the edge of the campus. Robert held up the yellow crime scene tape and they ducked under. They walked a few more feet.

“I'm concerned about ticks,” said Bigelow.

Robert said nothing. He stopped and shone the light at one of the open graves. “Here we are.”

“What about the chair?”

“Wait here,” said Robert. “I have to take the light to find it.”

“There are ticks here,” said Bigelow.

“Don't worry about ticks. They're everywhere.”

Bigelow said, “I don't want to miss the boat.”

*   *   *

“There's another light,” whispered Victoria.

“Damnation.”

“We'll have to check both of them. You take this close one,” said Victoria. “I know the path and you don't.”

“The police have a buddy system for a good reason,” said Howland. “We stick together.”

“One must be a sightseer,” said Victoria.

“Why in hell would anyone come sightseeing at three-thirty in the morning?”

“Fishermen,” said Victoria. “They're insane when the fish are running, but they're lunatics during the derby.”

Lights flickered on either side of them.

“Professor Bigelow is to go back on the paper boat this morning. He lost his glasses when he fell into the grave. Robert was to pick him up. That means…” she stopped.

Howland said, “Who's the Rabbit with Stevenson?”

*   *   *

Killdeer spotted the second light at the same time Victoria did and had the same baffled reaction. Two killers? Two sightseers at three-thirty a.m.? Fishing derby crazies?

Brownie kept up a low, steady growl. He headed toward one of the lights. Killdeer's hair rose on his arms. He trusted Brownie. One of the lights must belong to the killer.

*   *   *

When Rabbit snapped off the flashlight, Stevenson spotted the second light. Someone must have parked along Main Street and come through the underbrush.

“What do you make of that?” he asked Rabbit.

“Another fisherman. This place attracts more crazies than the Lizzie Borden place. People are ghouls.”

“Let's get out of here,” said Stevenson.

“We'll sneak up on them, give them a thrill.”

“Come on, Rabbit. I want out.” Stevenson started toward the car and realized that, without the light, he was likely to fall into one of the open graves. He stopped.

“You scared?” asked Rabbit in a low voice.

“Damned right, I'm scared.”

“Be a sport.” Rabbit turned the flashlight off again.

“If someone sneaked up on me right now,” Stevenson whispered, “I'd damned well have a heart attack.”

Rabbit laughed. “You got a weak heart?”

*   *   *

Robert hadn't gone far with the light before Bigelow called out, “Come back! Hurry!”

“I haven't found the chair,” Robert called back.

“Forget it!” Bigelow screamed.

“Are you okay?” Robert shouted.

“Hurry!”

*   *   *

“Did you hear that?” whispered Victoria.

They'd been standing, Victoria leaning on her lilac wood stick, Howland with his feet apart, arms folded, uncertain which way to go, when they heard Bigelow call out.

“Couldn't help but hear,” Howland answered.

Victoria started off with Howland holding the flashlight. She could see what must be Robert's flashlight moving erratically as he dodged between graves.

“What's your trouble?” Robert called.

“Something's crawling on me. I can't see! Get it off!”

“Oh, for God's sake,” said Robert. “Probably a tick.”

“I hate ticks! Get it off!”

*   *   *

“Did you hear that?” said Stevenson.

“You kidding?” answered Rabbit. “Wake the dead with that yelling back and forth.”

“Can't quite make out what they're yelling about.”

“May be in trouble. Let's get over there.”

“Damn! You're determined to keep me here.”

“Someone needs help,” said Rabbit. “Stay here if you want. I'm going.”

“No way am I staying here. One wrong step…”

Rabbit headed toward the voices, Stevenson behind.